tag: 100days

This is part 4 of an ongoing series on moving away from Windows and onto Linux. In this post we’ll take a look at what I consider the best Linux operating system for the average user. You’ve made the decision to move to Linux. Now comes the most challenging part: Which distribution should you use? There is a bewildering number of options and it is not at all clear what the differences are so you’re left adrift in that sea of options, unable to clearly see what direction to take. ...

This is part 2 of an ongoing series on moving away from Windows and onto Linux. In this post we’ll explore several alternatives for the most common programs that the average user is likely to use, along with a few o their pros and cons. If you watch most of the Linux related videos on Youtube it becomes apparent pretty quickly that most of those videos are aimed at “power users”. That is, they get pretty deeply into the inner workings of the operating system, often using a range of commandline tools to get work done. The average user, particularly the new ones coming from Windows aren’t really interested in those details. They want to know how to get things done. Preferably, using tools that are similar to, and as easy to use, as the one’s they’ve become accustomed to on Windows. ...

This is part 1 of an ongoing series on moving away from Windows and onto Linux. In this post we’ll explore the reasons for the move and examine the two main alternatives together with their benefits and challenges. Its seems that many people are looking to move away from MS Windows. There are at least a couple of reasons for this: Windows 10 support has come to end of life. This, together with changes to Windows 11 that essentially renders many computers – even fairly recent ones – useless as they no longer meet the requirements. This alone has caused a lot of folks to look else where. A lot of people don’t like the idea that Microsoft now requires that you have a Microsoft account in order to access your computer. This also, of course, means that your files are in the cloud, which is a situation that makes some folks (maybe many?) uncomfortable. Today I want to take a look at the two primary alternatives to Windows. But, before I do that, I want to point out that I’m looking at what I believe the average user wants and and needs in a computer, not at what the tech nerds consider important. One of the greatest challenges for the average person is making sense of all the gobbledygook that the tech nerds spew. You just want a system that works and lets you get your work done and that’s what I’m aiming to address. ...

While I still spend quite a lot of time viewing Youtube videos on various topics, including technology, I’ve become increasingly dissatisfied with the quality of many of those videos. Now, I watch them for two reasons: To learn about new technologies, equipment, software, etc; and, to learn actual skills for using those technologies. That is, I might watch a video to discover the pros and cons of a particular piece of software or hardware. Or, I might watch in order to learn how to do something with one of the technologies I’m already using. So, what’s the problem? ...

Okay, so in my last post I stated that I didn’t do a lot of distro hopping. And, for the most part that is true. That said, though, I do run a homelab and the whole purpose of that lab is to trial different operating systems, software, etc. In the process of exploring Omarchy and its related technologies (Wayland, Hyprland, etc) I ran across several other intriguing things that I wanted to try out. I’ve played with both Arch Linux (on which Omarchy is based) and NixOS in the past but never really gave either of them a fair shake. So, over the last couple of days I’ve been playing with both. Today I want to talk a little bit about NixOS. ...

Over the past 25 years I’ve played with a lot of Linux distributions. Many of those distributions have fallen by the wayside as developers shift focus, companies fold or are acquired by other companies, and so on. At the same time, new distributions, by the dozens it seems, have popped up to replace them. While I have always been curious about the various distributions I have increasingly begun to realize that for the most part the differences between them isn’t that great. When you really look at them most of the “new” distributions are simply riffs on other distributions, usually – but not always – Ubuntu. ...

If you’ve ever watched House Hunters on HGTV or any number of YouTube videos on moving to other countries one of the common themes you’ll hear is that people are moving “for a slower pace of life”. I’ve also run across dozens of articles in various magazines and websites that speak to this, as well. And it’s something I’ve never really quite understood. The question that always comes to my mind is, “why can’t they find that here?” ...

There are four things that have become increasingly irritating to me: The increase in advertising in damn near everything; The expectation that everything requires an app; The increasing “connectedness” of the things we use; and, the shift to a subscription model for almost all software. Today I want to focus on the subscription model. The Issue The main issue is that so many software companies have shifted to a subscription model for their software. But it’s not just software. Certain “features” of appliances and cars, and it seems many other things that we use and depend on have increasingly starting requiring subscriptions for their use. Some of this parallels the increasing expectation that we will be online and connected and a shift toward connected services which basically means that unless you are connected you don’t have access to those services. ...

My wife and I have been on the road for ten days. Starting in Atlanta, we flew to Portland, ME where we spent three days. Portland was an interesting experience. We live a suburban life, so going to a city that is alive with people, tourists and locals, was quite a change. At the same time, it was actually a lot fun. I wasn’t sure what I expected. The weather was awesome and actually a bit warmer than we expected. The town itself had a good feel to it and it’s actually one that I might want to revisit at some point. There were several things that surprised me, though. ...

For the last year or so I’ve been running a Proxmox server that hosts several virtual machines (VM) one of which, itself, hosts multiple docker images for services on which I rely. In addition to the VMs, I also run several LXC containers on the Proxmox server that provide some additional resources I frequently use. While watching some videos a few days ago I ran across a video where the presenter was demonstrating the use of XCP-ng. If you’re not familiar, XCP-ng is similar to Proxmox in that it is a type 1 hypervisor. A type 1 hypervisor is the operating system that allows one to run multiple VMs as if they were on the bare metal. ...